The Machine Gunners

DAVID DUNNICO& S A R A S M I T H

T heMachineGunners

DAVID DUNNICO & S A R A S M I T H

T heMachineGunners

M16

may f ind in the long run that tinned food is a deadlier weapon than the machine gun ~George Orwell

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The Machine Gunners

Dramat is Personae

I & Me & Himself........... Mr. David DunnicoShe & Her & Herself ...... Miss Sara SmithA driver of taxis………....HimselfA cast of a gun store ........The Gun Store cast (feat. Sonny)Chorus of the assorted......Themselves

The scene: A couple from Manchester in the United Kingdom, in the present day, holidaying in Las Vegas, Nevada, in the United States of America, also in the present day.

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Las Vegasis a lot like Blackpool (only not as classy) and it serves much the same purpose. It is where, be you American or English, (and able to pay) you can do things you would not or could not do at home. I suppose we could have gone and seen the Grand Canyon, but instead we went machine gunning.

I do not remember how I heard about The Gun Store, or indeed why I wanted to go. But somehow it crept just above Area 51 and just a little bit below the Hoover Dam on our itinerary. (In the end we didn’t see either.) I had never fired a gun before, although in common with every other child I grew up with, I rarely left home without a toy arsenal, ready and able to re-enact key moments of the Second World War.

We arrived in Las Vegas, via New York, on Halloween 2010.

The advert promised it was “Two minutes from the Strip”, but seemingly only if your getaway car could get to 90mph in the 12 lanes of traffic. After walking for a good deal longer than two minutes (not something done in those parts, even in the comparative cool of autumn), we gave up and asked at a motel for pop and directions. There was a problem with accents – we said gUN, they said gERn. I mimed shooting a gun, which was not a good idea. The receptionist was not going to let Marcel Marceau get away with a stick up. It was the kind of motel that offered weekly, daily and maybe even hourly rates, so a can of Mace was always handy should the customers need a dusting.

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DAVID DUNNICO & SARA SMITH

They suggested we wait for the concierge – who knew where everything was. Leafing through a lifestyle magazine, which was more Clark County than Country Life, we found an advert for The Gun Store, showed it the kindly lady on reception, who was surprised to realise gUN was Mancunian for gERn. She kindly rang a taxi and kindly told them when we asked for the “gUN shop” we meant the “gERn store”.

We set off down East Tropicana, soon passing The Liberace Museum, low and pink on our right – he would have preferred a place on the Strip, but even the Elvis-A-Rama Museum and Gift Shop could only manage a plot on Industrial Road.The taxi driver was efficient and friendly. I don’t think he was from the cab company the motel called, but saw us queuing efficiently by the kerbside and being friendly came over.

Him: You want the gERn Store right?Us: Yes please.Him: You guys from England?Us: Yes, from Manchester.Him: You goin’ to shoot some machine guns?Us: Yes.Him: Guess you don’t have machine guns in England then?Us: Only if you’re in the army.Him: That’s probably a good idea. You can only shoot them in the store; they’re banned in Las Vegas too.Us: We only get a few people shot to death in Britain.Him: Wow – murderers in England sure have to work hard to kill someone! Using a knife or strangling someone – that’s hard work. It’s a lot easier with a gun. Us:!

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We tried a bit of small talk, but our accents were still impenetrable. A few minutes later we were there. A charming, surgically enhanced lady and her friend greeted us at a table out front. Their job was to help customers negotiate the menu. It seemed churlish to have come all this way and not settle for three courses (the all you can shoot buffet was a bit pricey).

There were set meals such as:

World War 2Thompson SMG with 50 rounds MP40 SMG with 25 rounds 1911 Pistol .45 with 20 rounds Three Targets T-Shirt

Or, should a smoother experience be required (modern guns apparently have less recoil), we could use the modern guns of the “I-Rak Pak” (Iraq package). To our English sensibilities this seemed a touch insensitive given that it was close to Remembrance Sunday. So to the:

Ladies PackHand Gun with 20 rounds AR-15 with 10 rounds, or Beretta CX4 with 10 rounds Two TargetsGun Store Tank Shirt

was dismissed by Mrs Dave as too wussy. The lady agreed – these were what they gave children to shoot:

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$40 Kid’s Pack Ruger Mark III .22 with 20 rounds Semi-Auto .22 Rifle with 20 rounds Choice of targetChilds souvenir gift bag

So we made up our own selection, based on guns we had heard of. A Glock, because I liked the name and it was matt black and it looked like it might have been designed by Jonathan Ive and it looked like it might fire a laser beam instead of bullets. I followed this with a Sten gun, because my Action Man commando came with one and finally what I had really come for; an AK47, which was in the words of Samuel L. Jackson:

“The very best there is. When you absolutely, positively got to kill every motherfucker in the room, accept no substitutes.”

Herself chose a Smith and Wesson .44 ‘Dirty Harry’ (well she would wouldn’t she), an Uzi and an M16. Which was a lethal enough collection for someone who until we actually got to the front door was doubtful she would want to fire anything.

You could have a go of a large gun which looked like it could cut tanks in half – which made it’s name ‘M249 Saw’ (Squad Automatic Weapon) appropriate. But this seemed a tad louche for such as us. Lest we forget what we had chosen, we were given some cards to take inside.

Inside, a counter ran the length of a long wall on which were hung more than enough weapons to equip a small(ish) army.

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We handed the menu cards in and another lady asked for $319 (including applicable sales tax) and yes American Express would do nicely. At this point photo I.D. was required – not because you were going to be given lots of guns – but to make sure the credit on the card was good.

Now it was time, (“lady and gentleman”) to pick your targets. Across another wall were a dozen large paper targets to pick from. It shouldn’t have been a surprise to see Osama Bin Laden and a Zombie Bin Laden featured on two of the targets – I don’t think I would have been surprised to see an Obama Bin Laden, or even a JFK edition – perhaps they could have a: Presidents’ Pack Abraham Lincoln (Philadelphia Deringer)James A. Garfield (.442 Webley)William McKinley (.32 Iver-Johnson Safety Automatic)John F. Kennedy (Carcano M 91/38)Target Grassy knoll

I went for a generic zombie and two targets that looked like I imagined targets should look like. These were handed to us along with magazines of ammunition and a tray of bullets for the .44. Thus equipped, we joined the line for the shooting range itself. Being English we might be rubbish shots, but for now we could show them how to form an orderly queue. There was a hushed anticipation in the queue – none of the bravado I was expecting. We were both a little surprised to see other women in the queue, although none of them were wearing heels and a short, crocheted dress, as Sara was.

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I started to wonder if this was all such a good idea. As is sometimes the case when you make a decision to do something that might be a bad idea (such as going bungee jumping) once you had paid the process pushed you along. We had chosen, paid and were moving towards the bangs.

Next stop was to pick up ear defenders and eye protectors. Thoughtfully you could choose to colour coordinate your ear defenders. Sara picked pink, which given she doesn’t do fluffly, was an effort to sate her thirst for irony. I went for black (as I hadn’t noticed the pink ones). The man behind us also picked black. Sara suggested he might pick blue to go with his T-shirt. I don’t think he quite got it. Perhaps he was colour blind or perhaps thought “mad foreign woman in a dress and heels going to be given a gun soon – don’t encourage, don’t argue, pretend you can’t understand”.

Which was fair enough.

A member of staff told us to put on the glasses and ear defenders now, before we entered the range. We entered, through an anteroom like an air lock, about half a dozen at a time. As the first door opened you realised just why you needed to cover your ears – the noise was – well noisy.

There were perhaps 15 people in the small area where you shot from. Each group (most were made up of two or three men) had a member of staff with them, who would get the guns individually from the main shop area, set up your target, load the gun and instruct you in how to fire it.

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The targets were clipped to a zip wire which electrically moved them away – the bigger the weapon, the further away they zipped.

Who’s first? Ladies before gentleman. Smith before Wesson. The revolver was loaded and given to Sara.

BANG. BANG.BANG.

BANG,BANG,BANG,Smile.Reload.

BANG–BANG–BANG–BANG–BANG–BANG–CLICK.

The Smith and Wesson .44 looks like a gun and sounds like a bomb. It’s famous because Clint Eastwood stopped being a cowboy and started being a copper and asked:

“I know what you’re thinking. Did he fire six shots or only five? Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I’ve kinda lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?”

I couldn’t tell if Sara felt lucky.

AK47

happens, we have the Maxim gun, and they have not.

~Hilaire Belloc

Whatever

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My go.For h’orderves the Glock. Sonny, for it was to he our care had been entrusted, asked, “Have you ever shot a gun before?” (I think he could tell). “Don’t touch the trigger until you’re ready to shoot, push your hand right into the handle, wrap this thumb around the grip, steady it with your other hand, thumb on top. Left foot back, right knee bent, rest on elbow, lean towards the target, take aim and squeeze the trigger.”

I’m not sure he said any of that, some of it was probably mimed, I couldn’t hear much, but it was probably something close.

BHAM! – it didn’t break my arm so I went BHAM! 9 more times. I thought the target would flap and fall in tatters – I couldn’t even see any holes, so wasn’t sure I’d hit it. I didn’t think my glasses would fit under the safety goggles, so it would only be later, when I got the target back that I would find out what an indifferent shot I was.

After about the third BHAM! – I thought happiness might indeed at this moment be a warm gun. Although after about four BHAMS! I did wonder if those spent cartridges were supposed to fly up and bounce off the ceiling onto my head (it apparently was OK, but I could see why the glasses were worn).

Strangely, I didn’t feel strange (or even exhilarated). I did have a slight sense of relief that I hadn’t wasted 300 of Sara’s dollars.

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Already, firing guns had gone from being something unimaginable to something normal. It didn’t seem anything to do with killing people although that’s all machine guns are designed to do. I suppose this should have been something to worry about. However, from what I could see of my aim, unless my would-be-victim was a barn door, there was nothing to fear.

Time for a swap. Me for Sara, a hand gun for an Uzi. How to describe an Uzi? There’s a passage in the ‘Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ where Douglas Adams describes a gun thus;

“The designer of the gun had clearly not been instructed to beat about the bush. ‘Make it evil,’ he’d been told. ‘Make it totally clear that this gun has a right end and a wrong end. Make it totally clear to anyone standing at the wrong end that things are going badly for them. If that means sticking all sort of spikes and prongs and blackened bits all over it then so be it. This is not a gun for hanging over the fireplace or sticking in the umbrella stand, it is a gun for going out and making people miserable with.”

Which would be a good description of an Uzi.

The Uzi is named after its Israeli designer Uziel Gal (who modestly didn’t want the accolade) and since the 1950s, has sold to over 90 countries and more police and military markets than any other machine gun. It can fire 600 rounds per minute and is effective up to 200 metres. Over 10 million have been made, although the Israeli Defence Forces stopped using them in the 1980s, it’s probably better known now than then.

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None of this was of any relevance to Sara, who remembered it was one of the weapons Arnie used to destroy things in the Terminator films, before he could do much more damage by being a politician.

In the world of film, if Chicago gangsters favour the Thompson Sub-machine gun, L.A. Gangstas choose an Uzi. In the film ‘In Bruges’, one character decries to another:

“An Uzi? I’m not from South Central Los Angeles. I didn’t come here to shoot twenty black ten year olds in a drive-by. I want a normal gun for a normal person.”

Rat-a-tat-twat. Click.

He checked the gun was empty, but you still had to make sure it was pointed upwards and backwards and no fingers on the trigger please.

Time for a picture. Click.

I wanted a go of a machine gun too. The Sten was the Uzi of the Second World War. It was a bit crude, a bit deadly and dead cheap to make.

The Sten gun’s curious name came from its designers, Major Reginald V. Shepherd and Harold Turpin, and EN from the British armament manufacturers Enfield. It was in service between 1941 and the 1960s, over 4 million were made and were used by British troops, resistance fighters and insurgents.

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The design was simple almost to the point of crudeness – some versions had just 47 parts and could be made in about 5 man-hours in simple factories. It could fire 500, 9mm rounds every minute and came with a 32 round magazine.

I had heard about Stens. Firing the bugger was apparently something to be careful about. The man showed me how to hold it and how to keep my thumb out of the way of the bolt, which could really, really hurt.

Thumb tucked well away, I fired a couple of single shots, and then a longer burst and then I got carried away and tried to empty the magazine. The man stopped me (it might have been my maniacal look, or the way as each bullet left the barrel, my aim crept higher. I think he feared for the safety of the ceiling. Delight was mine when I realised there was a BOGOF on Sten gun magazines, so he reloaded and I got to fire another 32 rounds, I wish they did 3-for-2s.

Sara’s turn again. M16. There were a few of these – I was disappointed when they brought her a regular black one – there were a couple of pink ones in the shop, which I imagine is some sort of desert camouflage, rather than an attempt to colour-coordinate with the ear defenders?

The M16 was what the US military called their standard rifle. Once upon a time it was the AR-15 (A for Assault, R for Rifle) and made by ArmaLite.

Hence the Irish Republican ditty:

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“Down in Bogside, that’s where I want to be,Lying in the gutter with a Provo company,A comrade on my left, and another one on the right,And a clip of ammunition for me little ArmaLite.”

In 1959 ArmaLite sold the rights to Colt, who made 8 million of them. But ‘Colt’ didn’t rhyme with ‘Right’. It has been used in every American invasion since; from Vietnam to Iraq.

I heard the man explain about lining up a red dot on the target. I’m not sure what she lined the red dot up with, but the target fell down with her first shot. Sonny didn’t contradict her claim she was showing off her marksmanship by slicing through thin wires, but no one was going to venture out to pick it up, so he went into the shop and got a couple more.

He picked the Osama Bin Laden targets (he didn’t seem the type, friendly, competent, not gung-ho). Such was our swift descent from the moral high ground that the target was soon suffering from multiple holes.

Finally, what I had come for. A zombie target was set up and I was handed an AK47. If ever a gun had become a brand it was the Kalashnikov (named after it’s designer Mikhail Kalashnikov. In 2004, Vladimir Putin sent George W. Bush a bottle of vodka, made of crystal and shaped like an AK-47. It has even been made by Columbian peace activist César López into an ‘Escopetarra’ (Spanish for ‘shotgun’ and ‘guitar’). As far as I know it is unique in appearing on flags; Mozambique and Hezbollah and coat of arms; Zimbabwe and East Timor (I suppose it makes a change from lions).

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It was the Soviet Union’s most successful export –ask any African child solider. The US military became a major supplier of the gun when they bought lots from the Chinese and supplied them to the Mujahideen in Afghanistan and to the Iraqis.

Back in the Gun Store, the man explained this was more of a canon than the others I had tried. It had bigger bullets (7.62mm – the M16 takes 5.56mm) and made more of a bang. He liked the Kalashnikov, I could tell.

It certainly had more of a kick and got hotter than the others. It was something you aimed rather than sprayed as you did with the Sten. I still couldn’t see if I was hitting anything. When the target came back down the zip wire I had made sure the zombie wouldn’t be able to play the piano. There was a ring of holes around its right hand. The man explained you sometimes got this pattern with automatic weapons, but not why. Or perhaps he did, but I didn’t follow the mime.

Time for another photo. I didn’t realise at the time how big and stupid the cheesy grin I was wearing was.

Then it was over. The targets were folded and bundled into a plastic bag as souvenirs. We did wonder if the airport sniffer dogs would find these interesting. We picked a couple of t-shirts and a Gun Store post card.

As we were leaving the ladies out front asked if we enjoyed it – we just beamed. I took a photo of Sara underneath the store’s sign. On the door there was a warning:

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FOR THE HEALTH AND SAFETY OF OUR CUSTOMERS

ANY AMMUNITION BROUGHT IN FOR USE IN OUR RANGES

MUST BE LEAD FREE FRANGIBLE Apparently it was only us who thought the sign was a bit funny. Lead poisoning was no laughing matter in the state of Nevada.

We got the bus back to the Strip. It was hard not to tell our fellow passengers what we had just done. (They may have noticed The Gun Store plastic bags we were carrying our t-shirts and targets home in.)

Keeping it to ourselves proved too much for Sara. She casually dropped machine gunning into an exchange of pleasantries with an old lady who sat next to us. The old lady shifted slightly in her seat. I realised that most Americans don’t think machine gunning is a good way to spend an afternoon, it’s not nice and it’s not normal. Which is probably why we liked it. It was probably also something we would never do again.

And what now?

For the rest of the day we would excitedly tell each other what we had both experienced, even though we already knew. Tomorrow – to the Atomic Testing Museum where you could press a button and experience an atomic bomb blast…

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H&K MP5

robbers pry valuable rifle from Charlton Heston’s cold, dead hand.

~The Onion

Grave

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In 2006 there were 30,896 deaths from firearms in the USA. Cause of these deaths were:

Suicide: 16,883Homicide: 12.791Accident: 642Legal Intervention: 360Undetermined: 220

In addition firearms cause over 200,000 non-fatal injuries annually in the USA.

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David Dunnico’s Blog: http://daviddunnico.wordpress.com

Sara Smith doesn’t blog, rather she has a life.

Thanks to the cast of

The Gun Store Las Vegas

“You can’t buy machine guns in England?

Wow – I guess you’ve got to work hard to

kill someone over there!”

– Our taxi driver

The short, true account of a holiday outing in Las Vegas.

Documents

The Machine Gunners